Halo 3, Forza 2, Fable 2 and more bolster 'true next-gen'

MS talk big in LA...

Microsoft's pre-E3 conference threw up the expected announcement of Halo 3, and several other sequels to best-selling first-party franchises, whilst bosses claimed that this next wave of Xbox 360 titles will take advantage of the console to the full extent, ushering in the 'true next-generation'. Halo 3 was of course top of the list, but Fable 2 is also a tempting prospect, and Alan Wake will now be published by Microsoft exclusively for the Xbox 360 (and the PC). Then there was Forza 2, Shadowrun and last but not least, GTA 4 on Xbox 360 from the same day as the PS3. Oh yes.

Halo 3 was revealed via a trailer at the very end of Microsoft's press conference, and showed Master Chief being told that 'this is the end of the world'. There were also some bright colours and spaceships, but you could have predicted that, we'd imagine. The game will be out in 2007, that too was offered in the trailer, though specifics were unsurprisingly scant. Indeed, the announcements of Forza 2 and Fable 2 almost equal the emergence of Halo 3, given how long the unveiling had been predicted any way.

The Halo 3 trailer, and several others besides, is now available on Live to download, whilst trailers for Shadowrun and Alan Wake also impressed conference attendees. A hands-on walk through of the first Gears of War level also demonstrated just how hard Epic have been working on their 360 exclusive, too. Finally, Peter Moore promised a roster of 160 games on the new console by Christmas, and whilst Microsoft's showing was always going to struggle compete with the sheer importance of announcements from the other platform holders, they still managed a few surprise software confirmations. More on all this soon, then, including Redmond's plans for the Windows Vista platform and Xbox Live.

By Luke Guttridge